A First Rate Ship of War with Rigging &#…

Late C18th detailed engraving of a British Man-of-War.

The term Man-of-war  was generally used ; “A phrase applied to a line of battle ship, contrary to the usual rule in the English language by which all ships are feminine. It probably arose in the following manner: ‘Men of war’ were heavily armed soldiers. A ship full of them would be called a ‘man-of-war ship.’ In process of time the word ‘ship’ was discarded as unnecessary and there remained the phrase ‘a man-of-war.'”

— Talbot in Henry Fredrick Reddall Fact, fancy, and fable, 1892, p. 340